Denny
by alynwa
Summary: Alan wants Denny to tell him something about his past.  All BL characters belong to DE Kelley, all original characters are mine.


Denny

"It occurs to me, Denny, that we've been friends for three years now and I don't know a whole lot about your life before we met," Alan observed one evening after dinner. They had moved from the dining room into the den to relax and neither one felt inclined to watch television. Denny had picked up and opened a book he had started the day before yesterday and had left on the coffee table. "How about telling me something about your childhood?" he asked.

"My childhood? I'm seventy-two years old! Do you realize how long ago my childhood was? It's ancient history, stick with current events. Denny Crane! Here and now!"

Alan leaned back in his recliner and stretched his arms over his head and smiled affectionately at the older man on the couch. "Yes, the current Denny Crane is, admittedly, quite fascinating but, I _am_ curious about the Denny Crane of old. Think of it as me wanting to know more about the man behind the legend." He knew that if he appealed to Denny's enormous ego, he would be rewarded with, at the very least, one anecdote from Denny's past.

As he had hoped, Denny put his bookmark back and grunted, "All right." He placed the book next to him on the couch so he would remember to take it upstairs when he went to bed. "What do you want to know?"

"Tell me about your family. I know your father was also an attorney. What was his name?"

"Raymond. He was named after his maternal grandfather, Raymond Conner. My mother, Martha, was a housewife."

"You're an only child, right?"

Denny nodded affirmatively, "Yes but, it didn't start out that way. I was actually a middle child. My older brother, Conner, was seventeen when Pearl Harbor was attacked. He went to the recruiting office with some friends the very next day, lied about his age and joined the Marines. I remember my father being really angry at him for doing that but, he also bragged to his friends later about how proud he was that Connie was so gung-ho about fighting for our country. My mother was just scared because her baby was going to war. They were both devastated when he was killed in the Battle of Iwo Jima. I was nine years old when he died." Denny grew quiet for a moment, and then added softly, "I adored him. He was a good brother to me.

"I'm so sorry, Denny; I didn't mean to dredge up painful memories. You don't have to tell me anymore."

"I want to, Alan. And, to be honest, it's not painful anymore; he did die more than sixty years ago. It just is what it is. My sister, Cheryl, was three years younger than I am. She looked just like our mother; light brown hair, slender, tall, pretty face. In personality, she was more like our father; outgoing, personable but, a little hot-tempered." He laughed and stood up to walk over to the fireplace. He began to poke at the logs. Alan watched him as the sparks flew and the flames got larger. Apparently satisfied, Denny closed the fireplace's glass doors and placed the poker back in its holder and straightened. "I was just thinking about when she started dating. Any guy who asked her out not only had to deal with my dad, who was bad enough; he also had to deal with me. With Connie gone, I felt it was my duty to protect our sister. It didn't matter that I was trying to deflower everyone _else's_ sister. After all, Denny Crane! _My _sister was supposed to remain pure and untouched. She and her husband, Frank, were married for three years before she admitted to me that they used to do it in our guest house. Three years married and I was ready to kick his ass anyway for screwing my sister before he put a ring on her finger."

Alan chuckled and said, "I can believe that. You've always struck me as the protective sort. Do you have any nieces or nephews?"

Settling himself back onto the couch, Denny pointed to the bookcase and said, "If you look on the bottom shelf where you see the photo albums, there should be one that's cream-colored. Yes, that one. Bring it here, please." Alan sat next to Denny and handed him the album. He opened it and the first photo was of a young Denny Crane wearing a morning suit lovingly gazing down and holding hands with a brunette bride with an incredibly gorgeous smile. "This is my first wife, Charlotte Adams. Her family can trace their lineage back to one of the country's Founding Fathers, Samuel Adams; a fact they reminded me of more than once. They were not pleased when we started dating. Her parents considered my family _nouveau riche _because we didn't become wealthy until the mid-1800s when my grandfather invested in real estate." He turned to the next photo, a group shot of the wedding party that was taken outside in a garden. Denny and Charlotte were seated with the bridesmaids standing behind her and the ushers standing behind him. A little girl who looked to be about six years old sat smiling on Denny's lap and a boy who appeared to be three sat grinning happily on Charlotte's. "My niece Alex and my nephew, Frank Jr. were our flower girl and ring bearer. They were great, well-behaved children."

"Cute kids." Alan took the album back and studied the picture closely. "You never mention them or your sister, for that matter. You don't keep in contact with them?"

"Well, unfortunately, about a year after the wedding the entire family was killed in a car accident on the way to Cape Cod."

Alan sat stunned into shocked silence. Denny looked at him and rubbed his arm. "Listen, Alan, it's alright. Really. I mean, it's sad but, it happened a long, long time ago. And believe it or not, I really don't mind talking about my past with you. Hell, no one else has expressed an interest in hearing these stories in at least forty years."

Alan let out a long breath and asked, "Are you sure, Denny?" When Denny nodded, he smiled and looked back at the wedding album. "You and Charlotte made a handsome couple; you both look so happy."

Denny touched the picture and smiled as the memories came back. "We were. Charlie was a great gal, so different from her parents. She had the usual Boston Brahmin upbringing: private schools, debutante cotillions and balls, summers in Nantucket, the whole nine yards but, Alan, she was the most down to earth woman I had ever met in my young life. I loved dating her. She could go from playing softball in cut-offs, sneakers and a T-shirt to hosting a fifteen course dinner party for twelve without missing a beat. She introduced me to a lot of important people, some of whom eventually became clients of mine. My parents fell in love with her as soon as I introduced her to them. They were thrilled when we became engaged."

"The engagement and wedding announcements were published in the New York Times and the Boston Globe. Our wedding was one of the social events of the season. Everyone who was anyone in Boston had received an invitation. It was opulent and over-the-top and every minute of it was planned down to the last detail. It went off without a single hitch.

That entire day was a magical time for me. The marriage however, not so much. Charlie tried but, I was too focused on building my reputation and the firm I had started with my father. She ended up leaving me six months later because she felt I was putting my career ahead of her. At the time, I denied it but, as time passed I came to realize that she had been right. Her family used its influence to have the marriage annulled as if what we had had never happened. That hurt. I felt trivialized. Two years later, she married a man her parents approved of and moved to San Francisco."

Alan pursed his lips as he closed the wedding album and replaced it in the bookcase. As he sat down in the recliner again he said, "I'm almost afraid to ask anything else. How about _you_ tell _me_ about some of the happier times in your life?"

Denny smiled and inquired, "Are you sure you want to hear my old war stories? I've got tons of them, you know. You could end up bored out of your mind." Alan's response was to ease down farther into his seat, put his elbow on the arm of it and place his chin in the palm of his hand, giving Denny his complete and undivided attention. "Okay," he laughed, "You asked for it."

"We owned a small farm in Iowa for years and we would spend a month there every summer." Denny laughed, "My parents had bought it before I was born. I still call it a farm even though we didn't have crops or livestock there. When they bought it, the fifty acres the house sat on actually did have corn and potatoes growing. After those were harvested, my dad planted trees and let the majority of the land go wild. The two or three acres immediately surrounding the house became our lawn. Dad and Connie built a large barbecue pit behind the house and put down stone tiles to form a patio. I was way too young to help them so my job was bringing them lemonade and water when they got thirsty."

Denny stood up, stretched and then walked to the bookcase where his photo albums were stored. "It was wonderful," he said as he ran his fingers over several albums before selecting one and returning to the couch. He flipped through several pages, then handed the album to Alan and pointed to a picture. "Dad, Connie and me," he explained.

Alan examined the black and white photograph Denny had pointed out. It was of a man who appeared to be in his late thirties, a teen-aged boy and a younger boy who looked about five years old. Raymond Crane was hunkered down in front of a barbecue pit made out of cinderblocks. Denny's brother Conner was leaning against the pit just behind his father and Denny stood between his father's legs flashing a front-toothless smile at the camera. Father and son were similarly dressed in coveralls, plaid shirts and boots, though Denny's were cowboy boots. "Denny," he said laughingly, "you were just so gosh-darned cute!"

Denny grunted once and looked disapproving but, Alan was studying the picture and didn't notice. Watching him, Denny remembered that Alan had a less than stellar childhood. _He told me once that his family never took a vacation so, I guess the idea of a vacation home is strange, _he thought. Out loud, he said, "My mother took the picture. She loved taking pictures of her family but, there are very few of her because she never liked the way she looked in them."

Alan replied, "Really" and flipped a few more pages that contained more photos of the Crane males around the farm doing various things. One picture showed young Denny, his brother and his father with fishing poles and assorted camping gear piled at their feet and he held up the album so Denny could see and pointed to it. "Tell me about this, Denny," he said.

"When I turned six years old, my father started taking me camping overnight with him and my brother. That picture was the first time he took me. Dad wouldn't let me carry anything except the bag of sandwiches my mother made because everything else was either too heavy or too important to entrust to me. Mother wasn't thrilled with the idea of me going even though the place Connie and Dad always went to was on the farm next to a creek that was not five hundred yards from the house. But, to me, it felt like we were in the middle of nowhere." Denny started laughing and said, "My favorite story at the time was about the monkey, Curious George. I kept asking Dad if there were monkeys in the trees. He would just smile and Connie teased me the entire time we were out there by pointing at the trees and yelling 'There's a monkey! There's one!' and when I didn't see it, of course, he would say I didn't look fast enough. I think I was eight before I realized there were no wild monkeys in Iowa.

Those were wonderful, glorious times on that farm! Dad taught Connie and me how to fly fish and build a campfire. He was friends with a man who ran a riding stable where he taught us how to ride a horse. Connie and I loved being in Iowa. It was so different from Boston. Mother hated it. She used to say if she wanted to rough it, she would have married a farmer." Denny laughed out loud thinking about it. He guffawed, "Of course, 'roughing it' for my mother was not having servants at her beck and call. Dad said that built character; she would call _him _a character and suffer in not-quite silence until we returned to Massachusetts.

"If she hated it so much, Denny, why would she go every summer?" Alan appeared genuinely puzzled.

Denny's face softened as he said, "Because she loved us more. She and my father had a really good marriage; they truly were each other's best friend. That's why every summer, she would pack our suitcases and dutifully endure the trip to Iowa. She refused to clean the fish we caught but, she would cook them after my father did. And, to be honest, she wasn't exactly suffering. Dad, Connie and I would be off all day doing whatever and she would be at home with my sister baking cookies or whatever. In the evenings, she and my father would sit on the front porch on the wooden porch swing with a glass of sherry and talk. We were expressly forbidden to interrupt them while they were out there unless one of us was on fire. That was their time to decompress and reconnect."

Alan sat up. "Like us," he said.

"Huh?"

Alan leaned forward and repeated, "Like _us_. It was _your_ idea that we have scotch and cigars on your balcony every evening we're together. And even though you've never said anything, I know you don't like it when someone comes out on the balcony while we are having our time. I see it in your face. I think, subconsciously, you want to recreate what you saw growing up: Two best friends taking time everyday to strengthen their bond."

Denny sat back on the couch and studied Alan closely for a few seconds. "I think you're right," he said quietly. "I haven't thought about them on the porch in years but, maybe that is why I wanted us to have our Balcony Time." Denny shook his head and laughed softly. "It's strange; you think you're nothing like your parents and then one day, someone points out something that makes you realize you are _exactly_ like them on some levels."

Alan closed his eyes and nodded his agreement. "It unnerves me sometimes when I look in the mirror and see my father's face staring back at me. I also see my mother and father reflected in my attitude sometimes. My standoffishness, my stubbornness, my difficulty connecting with people; all comes from my parents, I think. You know, I think I would have liked meeting _your_ parents and siblings. I think I would have liked the young Denny Crane."

At that, Denny puffed out his chest and declared, "Of course, you would have! Our friendship is timeless! If I had met you when I was thirty-five, I would have thought 'When that six year old grows up, we're going to be drinking buddies!'"

Alan almost fell off his chair, he laughed so hard. "Denny," he guffawed, "I think even my emotionally cut-off father would have looked askance at a grown man predicting that future for his son!" He wiped tears from his eyes and got himself under enough control so that only the occasional giggle betrayed how tickled he still was. "Okay," he hiccupped, "Tell me something else about your father. Was he an affectionate man? You know neither of my parents was. I wonder, sometimes, what I would have been like if they had been."

Alan could tell that Denny really was enjoying recounting memories of his youth and young adulthood. He watched as Denny used the intercom next to the couch to call his butler, Rodeo, to bring a bottle of scotch and glasses. When he arrived carrying a tray on which sat a decanter of single malt scotch, a small ice bucket, tongs and two glasses, Alan's mind went back to the last thing Denny said to him and he started laughing all over again. Rodeo straightened his back proudly and moved quickly to place the tray on the coffee table. Quietly and efficiently, he poured the dark liquor into the glasses and handed one to each man.

"Thank you, Rodeo," Denny said as Alan went into another fit of giggles. "Don't mind Alan; I just told one of my many jokes. You know, I could have been a standup comic if I hadn't become the greatest lawyer in the country."

"Yes, yes, of course, Denny. Rodeo, please don't think my mirth is at your expense! Thank you and please tell your wife that dinner was superb tonight." With what appeared to be some effort, Alan calmed himself, sipped his drink and settled back into the recliner. Neither man noticed that when Rodeo turned to leave, he had a very bemused look on his face.

"What did you ask me?"

"What kind of man was your father."

Denny sat up. "Oh, right. He wasn't a real touchy-feely kind of guy but, he hugged me and Connie as much as he hugged Cheryl. He didn't exclude his sons when it came to showing affection. I thought all my friends' fathers were like that until one summer when my friend Peter and I came home after two weeks in camp and our dads were at the bus station to meet us. We had seen them from the window and were so excited. I jumped off the last step and straight into my dad's arms. Peter tried to do the same thing and his father put out his hand, said 'Hold on, Tiger!' and grabbed Peter's hand and shook it. We were eight years old for God's sake! When Dad and I were alone in our car, I tried to ask him about it and he said something like everybody isn't comfortable with showing emotion."

Alan nodded his understanding and then asked, "So, you could say your father was an emotional man?"

Grabbing the decanter to freshen their drinks, Denny answered, "I wouldn't say that. Like most men of his generation, the emotion he was most comfortable showing was anger. My mother was the only person I'm aware of who never bore the full brunt of his anger. He truly loved her unconditionally. However, my father's personal code of ethics and integrity was so strong, it made loving anyone else unconditionally impossible, or at least, extremely difficult. He loved his children but, he still disowned his only living child because of his principles. During that murder case we tried together, he felt that my legal tactics crossed into territory that was just too far outside his code so he dissolved our legal firm, disowned me and never spoke to me again unless it was absolutely necessary. All of that to say that he was an extremely complicated man."

Alan tasted his drink and thought about what Denny had told him. "I can definitely relate to that. My father, when sober, barely said anything to me or my mother. When he was drunk, we barely said anything to _him_ because whatever was said would send him off the deep end and there would be no peace for the rest of the night.

Listening to your stories about your parents and your siblings, even the sad stories, makes me a little envious. I don't usually feel sorry for myself for having had the childhood I had but, I used to spend hours in my room daydreaming about being part of a family like the one I see in your photo albums."

The older man looked at Alan with eyes full of love and affection and replied, "You _are_ a part of the family. Would you bring me the album with the red cover? I want to show you something." Alan came back from the bookcase and passed the album to Denny, who motioned for him to sit on the couch beside him. Denny placed it on their two touching legs and opened it to show it was filled with pictures of the two of them.

Alan recognized immediately the picture of them holding salmon they caught (well, the salmon _he _caught and the head of the salmon Denny shot); however, looking through the rest, he realized most of them he had never seen before. The pictures, for the most part, all seemed to have been taken at social events like The Annual Crane Poole and Schmidt Christmas Party and the Boston Legal Group's fundraiser. There was a picture of Alan speaking at a seminar hosted by Yale Law in which you could also see Denny sitting in the front row looking on approvingly. He looked at Denny and asked, "Where did you get these?"

Denny waved his hand casually and answered, "Oh, I get one or two of the First Years to find out and contact whoever took pictures at any function we attend and get copies made of any that include you and me. The ones I like I put in here."

"I didn't know that! You never told me that!"

Denny grunted, "I don't tell you everything! I have to keep a little mystery between us to keep things fresh. But, in case you don't know, I will tell you this: I have considered you my family for quite some time. In fact, you are my _only _family now. If Connie and Cheryl were alive today, they would love and accept you as family, too."

Alan was touched by Denny's words and struck once again by the depths of his feelings for the man. He still didn't quite know why or how Denny had become so important to him; he only knew that he _was_ and that, luckily for him, those feelings of friendship were reciprocated. He had been betrayed so many times in his life by people who claimed to have, or should have, loved him that he had come to think of himself as flawed somehow and thus, unlovable. He could count on one hand the people he believed really did love him and Denny was one of them. He knew if he articulated what he was thinking, he would become a little emotional and though Denny had mellowed quite a bit because of their friendship, he still wasn't much of a sentimentalist. He cleared his throat and replied, "Thank you for telling me that. I love you too, Denny."

"Good," Denny said, "How about heading upstairs to watch a movie? Bring a couple of the albums if you want. I can tell you more stories if you like." Without waiting for an answer, Denny lurched up from the couch, picked up his book and proceeded to leave the room. Alan put away the album he had been holding and selected two more to take upstairs. He called Rodeo on the intercom to take hot chocolate and popcorn to the master bedroom. He hugged the albums to his chest, turned off the lamps and followed Denny upstairs.

_I hope to hear a lot more of your stories, Denny, _he thought.


End file.
